The recent discussion of the U.S. tolerance for waterboarding has been dominated by a certain Alice-in-Wonderland quality lately, but when a top U.S. State Department official can’t even comment on Americans being waterboarded by foreign governments, the debate has officially gone down the rabbit hole. (via Talk Left) The top legal adviser within the US […]
Monday’s political round-up
Today’s installment of campaign-related news items that wouldn’t generate a post of their own, but may be of interest to political observers: * It looks like John Edwards will go a little further than he has before in challenging Hillary Clinton: “Senator Clinton is voting like a hawk in Washington, while talking like a dove […]
How a bill doesn’t become a law
A few weeks ago, shortly after his veto of the bipartisan State Children’s Health Insurance Program (S-CHIP) bill, the president was asked at a press conference why the process broke down. A reporter said, “Isn’t there a responsibility by both the President and congressional leadership to work on this common ground before it gets to […]
‘Gender card’ nonsense makes a comeback
Last week’s inane discussion about whether Hillary Clinton played the “gender card” after the most recent debate seemed, thankfully, to be dying on the vine. The media was a little too excited to have a new narrative to bat around, but the truth is, Clinton never actually said sexism drove her Democratic rivals to criticize […]
McCain, Giuliani get personal over torture
One would like to think that the Republican Party has advanced to the point in which a debate over torture would no longer be necessary, but we’re apparently not quite there yet. Given the circumstances, I suppose we should be pleased that there are still voices of opposition within the GOP at all. Rudy Giuliani’s […]
Evidence of Iran’s nuclear-weapons program still elusive
If you listen to White House officials, Iran’s nuclear-weapons program is already a reality. There’s no hesitation on the rhetoric — the program, top administration officials say, is an unfortunate reality that demands our immediate attention. As Dick Cheney recently put it, “Our country, and the entire international community, cannot stand by as a terror-supporting […]
Bring on the brokered Republican convention!
For the last several decades, the Republican Party’s presidential nominating process has been relatively predictable. At least since the advent of the modern primary system, with the possible exception of 1980, the GOP nominee has either been an incumbent president, incumbent vice president, or the guy embraced early on as the establishment’s choice. Bruising primary […]
A ‘politically courageous’ Iranian policy
I’m a little surprised Barack Obama’s policy pronouncement on Iran the other day isn’t a bigger deal. Especially among the netroots, I’ve noticed there’s been some fully-justified complaints that Obama has been afraid of taking bold policy positions, and has struggled to articulate new ideas that are both progressive and a break with political orthodoxy. […]
The new ‘national security’ issue?
From time to time, advocates of one policy position or another will try to connect an unrelated matter to national security. For example, you might hear someone say immigration is a national-security issue because we don’t want terrorists sneaking across the border illegally. Or energy policy is a national-security issue because we don’t want to […]
The Clinton records ‘gotcha’
In the most recent debate for Democratic presidential candidates, Tim Russert confronted Hillary Clinton on the issue of records from her husband’s White House. Russert argued, “[A]s you well know, President Clinton has asked the National Archives not to do anything until 2012” about records pertaining to communications between the Clintons. The senator noted that […]